Candlemas, 1968
by Shrrgnien
Summary: Zoë belongs to the Hunters, entirely; but she belonged to her goddess first.


**Candlemas, ****19****68****; Ouachita National Forest, Arkansas**

"Zoë?" Ari's voice was thick with frustration. "I don't think this is right."

Zoë leaned over to inspect the girl's work. "It is very nearly right," she assured her. "You know what to do. The rest is largely practice." The arrow would never fly true, of course; the feathers were offset too dramatically. But for a beginner's attempt, it was respectable. She handed Ari the prepared arrow she had been working on, as well as a completed one to use as a template."Here. It takes time to learn these things. Why not see if you can fletch this one?"

Ari took a deep breath, then nodded and took the arrow. Her unhappy sigh sent a cloud of steam into the cold air. "I thought I had it that time," she said glumly.

Zoë smiled and ruffled her hair. "You came very close," she assured the little redhead. "I am quite proud of thy progress."

That perked her up. Blue eyes sparkled again, and all was right in the world.

"Remember," Zoë said as she handed Ari a tube of glue and a spool of waxed thread. "Do not trim the spine, only the vanes."

Ari nodded determinedly, frowning in concentration. "Got it."

Zoë left her to trial and error, smiling to herself as she picked up a fresh shaft and set about carving a nock in one end.

She didn't notice that they had company until her absentminded groping for her spare thread was interrupted by warm fingers pressing it into her hand.

"Good morning, Lady Artemis," she said mildly, picking at the thread until she found its free end.

"You're both up rather early. Good morning, Ari," she added kindly, and was rewarded with a quick wave. Zoë glanced over; for some reason Ari had two separate strings in her mouth, but her fletchings seemed surprisingly even thus far, so she didn't say anything. Artemis' amusement was palpable as she moved her lieutenant's pile of blank shafts off the log and sat down. "Any opportunity to teach, Zoë?"

"She wanted to learn, my lady." Ari nodded next to her.

Artemis smiled at the girl. "Your initiative is admirable, young one. I'm told you're making progress."

Ari made a noncommittal noise and bit her lip, clearly struggling to remember the way Zoë'd gotten her fletchings attached. Rather than embarrass her with explaining again, Zoë simply cleared her throat. If her movements were slightly slower and more exaggerated as she whipped the front of the feathers, well, that was her own business.

Ari brightened, shifted on her snowy log, and set about her task with renewed enthusiasm. Smiling fondly, Artemis took up a blank shaft of her own and borrowed Zoë's knife. The sun rose slowly—Apollo _would_ drag his feet going out in the winter—and birds started stirring around them. Somewhere a crow scolded whatever creature had been unforgivably rude enough to disturb it. Morning gradually grew warmer, and finally Zoë set down a half-finished arrow and unzipped her parka.

"How're these?" Ari yawned. Zoë held out a hand for the trio of arrows the girl had finished, turning them over carefully in her hands. She congratulated the young Hunter on her improvement, gently pointed out the irregularities that could be improved on, and offered her a pair of blank shafts. Ari heaved a heavy sigh and picked up her knife again.

Artemis shook her head and smiled at them both. "You work too hard," she said quietly. Zoë rolled her eyes and reached for a new shaft, only to find that Artemis had already finished them all. _Olympians_.

Artemis smirked. "I heard that."

_You are not helping thy case._

_Mmm. __Come here, dear one._

* * *

**December 17, 2007; Lincoln, Maine**

It would have been naïve to assume she would let the matter rest.

Artemis' lieutenant was on her almost before the boy, Percy Jackson, had moved away. She sighed at the approaching footsteps, but didn't turn.

"I will not change my mind, Zoë," she said quietly.

"And I will not leave thee to face this creature alone, whatever it may be." Fates bless her and her damned loyalty. It was going to get her killed one of these days.

Artemis raised an eyebrow without looking around at her lieutenant. Zoë would read the movement in her body language either way.

"And when you face the Python on the ground, alone?" She kept her voice carefully neutral. "Or a full-blooded Titan? _Typhon__?_ I do not question your courage, dear heart, and I would cheerfully fight duels to defend your honor; but there are battles no mortal has any place in. Often as I forget it, Zoë, you are mortal_._"

She felt rather than saw Zoë stiffen. After so long, with her heritage plain in every line of her body, in every movement, Artemis suspected there were months at a time even Zoë forgot that she was no longer the daughter of a Titan and a goddess.

She wasn't able to keep a slight undertone of desperation out of her voice. "Chiron cannot hold me," she warned her goddess.

Artemis snorted. "The Fields of Punishment would struggle to hold you against your will, Zoë. I certainly wouldn't envy Chiron the task. Luckily he will not have to, because you _will_ stay in Camp Half-Blood until I call for you."

"My life has always belonged to thee," Zoë protested. On any other day Artemis would be wryly amused by her blatant disregard for a direct order. "If it is the price of thy safety, then it is a price—"

"—not to be paid lightly!" Finally, Artemis whirled to face her lieutenant. "Nor without absolute necessity. Do not mistake this for a lover's request. Zoë, in a fight between immortals, you will do _nothing_ but slow me down!"

It was the wrong thing to say, and Artemis realized it the moment the words left her mouth. Zoë's dark eyes blazed; she drew herself up with a regal air that reminded her goddess _exactly_ whose daughter she was speaking to. Still, her voice was low and calm when she spoke.

"You do not know that, my lady."

Artemis closed her eyes, counted to five, and opened them again. "I do, and you know it just as well. You will do me and your sisters far more good in New York."

Out of ammunition and nursing wounded pride, Zoë said nothing. Artemis sighed.

"Oh, my dear one." She reached out to tuck a stray hair behind Zoë's ear. "Don't look at me like that. If we suffer another giant rebellion, you will never leave my side again. I shall keep you so close you grow tired of me and defect to Dionysus." She ran light fingers along Zoë's jaw and moved to kiss her gently; Zoë turned away.

Artemis felt cold for the first time since winter had begun. "Zoë," she sighed, leaning into the taller girl's shoulder. "Please. You do me a disservice, of course I would rather have you with me. Do not make this harder than it already is. One trip, dear heart, and I am yours when I return. Don't look at me as if I'm rejecting you, Zoë, I can't bear it."

There was a long silence as the waves rolled and broke against the cliff face in the dark. Finally, Zoë shifted and reached up to squeeze Artemis' hand in her own.

"I will not pretend to like this, my lady," she murmured.

Artemis' lips twitched, and she pulled back just enough to play with the feathery strands of hair behind Zoe's ears. "Stubborn as always...I do not ask you to pretend. Take heart, dear one. I will return soon enough, and then perhaps we will hunt prey that meets with your approval." That, finally, drew a small smile from her huntress.

"Am I forgiven?" she asked as charmingly as she could manage.

Zoë gave her a Look. "I shall consider it when you return, my lady."

Artemis looked back out over the lightening sea and tried to ignore the faint sense of dread in the back of her mind. "There is more at work here than a mere beast, Zoë," she said finally. "Otherwise we would not require such caution. When I know more, you will be the first to hear of it." She squeezed her lieutenant's elbow; the girl reached out automatically and stroked her fingers, seeking a sense of solidity. Artemis forced herself to smile. "And now, however much I enjoy your company, I think young Bianca has greater need of it."

Zoë looked over her shoulder. Bianca was in Cynthia's capable hands, but still glancing over at her lieutenant every few seconds, like she wanted reassurance that she was doing the right thing. Zoë nodded to the girl and graced her with a rare, warm smile, and Bianca sat up a little straighter as she helped Alene pack down bedrolls.

Artemis drew two knuckles down Zoe's cheek, feather-light. "Go," she said gently. "I will keep an eye on my brother."

Zoë lingered a moment, squeezed Artemis' fingers, and only then turned away and back to her sisters.

The goddess fought off a sudden chill, and waited for sunrise.

* * *

**April 12th, 2001; Noxapater, Mississippi**

"Careful," warned Cynthia. "It's hot."

Zoë took the platter carefully by the edges and managed not to wince as she balanced it on a rock to carve their guests a piece of rabbit.

"Thanks," the daughter of Zeus—Thalia—muttered. Her tense wariness seemed to have worn off; she didn't appear to have the energy for it anymore. The little blonde girl accepted her paper plate (100% biodegradable, courtesy of Iris) without a word, grey eyes wide as they stared around as if trying to take in everything at once.

The boy also took his portion silently, though he threw in a distasteful glare as well. Zoë instantly regretted giving him a larger portion than—Annabeth, she thought her name was. Still, laws of hospitality were not to be trifled with, even if one's guests didn't seem terribly concerned with their obligations to their hosts.

Diana cleared her throat from the boy's other side. "Trade you," she said, standing up to hand a steaming pot of pasta over the fire. Zoë stood to accept it, and Alene made a flying leap to rescue the rabbit plate before it leaped into the flames in a final act of defiance.

"Thank you, Alene," Zoë muttered around the knife in her teeth.

The Hunters of Artemis were an ancient and solemn sisterhood. A well-oiled machine.

"You forgot the spoon, Di," said Phoebe before helpfully tossing it at her. Diana dodged, and a wooden spoon struck the boy square between the eyes. Zoë choked on a knife trying to keep a straight face.

Thalia had no such obligation of politeness, and almost fell off her log laughing. Little Annabeth giggled as well, though she was much more focused on the plate of hot, fresh food in front of her than anything else.

"Shut up," the boy muttered, but he looked distinctly less angry now that Thalia was the one laughing at him.

"Not happening, Luke," Thalia grinned. "I wish I had a camera. That was perfect. Nice aim, uh..."

"Phoebe," smirked Phoebe.

Shaking her head, Zoë turned her attention back to the child. Annabeth had wolfed down almost the entire portion of rabbit she'd been given already; Zoë wondered how long it had been since the little girl had a warm meal.

"Here," she said quietly, using the knife to push a generous helping of some sort of curly pasta onto Annabeth's plate. As an afterthought, she added about a third of her own rabbit.

Luke was glaring at her again. "She can do that herself," he argued. "She doesn't need your help."

Thalia frowned. "Lighten up, Luke." She nodded to Zoë as the lieutenant leaned forward to give her some noodles. "She's just trying to help."

If possible, Luke's glare turned filthier, but he didn't say anything. Zoë decided to just hand him the pot rather than deal with serving him. He didn't burn himself taking it, which was a pity.

"She's trying to do a lot more than that," he muttered under his breath. Zoë ignored him. She had taken a dislike to this boy from around the time he rolled his eyes when they'd burned the rabbit's fat and bones to Artemis—as if such a basic courtesy that required very little sacrifice on their part was an excessive waste of time. She hadn't missed the look he'd shared with Thalia, either, but at least _she_ was being moderately reasonable.

Zoë had trouble reserving any benefit of the doubt for a young man who would sooner drag a hungry child out into the dark than unbend his pride enough to accept a night's hospitality from a "cult that worships Artemis".

Annabeth was now looking up at Zoë, curious. "How long have you been a Hunter?" she wanted to know.

"Just over two thousand years," she answered. This immediately resulted in a barrage of piercing questions regarding Olympian blessings, Zoë's godly status and lack thereof, and extremely specific inquiries about the mechanics of functional immortality and non-aging that really no nine-year-old should have been able to formulate. Thalia shrugged at Zoë behind Annabeth's back and focused on her food.

Luke managed to keep his opinions to himself for the rest of the meal, thankfully, and Zoë was able to mostly ignore him. Annabeth and Thalia were much easier to speak with—the warmth, rest, and food were beginning to animate them a little, enough that despite Luke's obvious disapproval the girls were offering up tidbits of their own stories.

Thalia gave a low whistle at Phoebe's abridged version of how they'd found Ari half-dead and trying to pilfer their supplies in the middle of nowhere. "And we thought Annabeth's was bad," she said. Phoebe reached over and ruffled Ari's hair, tucking the younger girl under her arm reassuringly. "She was hiding in an alley when we found her."

"I ran away," Annabeth said, not making eye contact with anyone. "They didn't want me there. There were too many monsters."

Phoebe shook her head. "Ain't that a bite," she murmured. "Poor kid."

Thalia blinked, then shook off the odd turn of phrase in favor of putting an arm around Annabeth's shoulder. "_We_ want you," she said firmly.

"The three of us are a better family than any of the ones we had before," said Luke. Bright blue eyes—Hermes eyes, she saw them every time Ari looked up at her—darted around the fire like they were daring someone to challenge him.

"We know," Kim said instead. Even Luke, confronted with her calm positivity, looked vaguely ashamed. Owen whined at Kim's feet and sniffed hopefully at the scraps of leftover rabbit on her plate. "No," she told him, only to sigh when Tori whistled and set her own plate down in front of him. "Well, now you've done it," she said. "You're spoiling him, you know."

Tori nudged her. "And you _don't_."

"Not around company," Kim said primly.

Zoë shook her head fondly, which was frankly how she spent at least thirty percent of any given day, and pushed herself to her feet. This drew every eye around the fire; she waved them off, and they went back to watching Diana fiddling with the tuning keys on her lyre. Diana. A child of Apollo to the death. Of _course_ she couldn't resist a fresh audience.

Well, Zoë was unfortunately going to have to deny her one.

"Thalia," she said quietly. "Will you walk with me?"

Thalia looked surprised, but stood up immediately. Luke, looking much less welcoming, made to follow her.

"_Just_ Thalia, please," said Zoë. Thalia's expression at this was a mixture of smugness and irritation.

"What's going on?" she asked as Zoë led her a short distance away into the trees. "If you guys want us to move on, we can. Annabeth needs a decent night's sleep, though."

"She will have it," Zoë assured her. "All of you...even the boy...are welcome here for the night, though I regret that we cannot stay longer than sunrise tomorrow. Lady Artemis is not with us, and the Hunt must keep moving if we are to survive."

"Yeah," Thalia muttered. "I know the feeling."

Zoë made a face. "Quite. I hope that eliminating the Laestrygonians on thy tail will have bought thee a few days, but if you choose to leave us you must make good use of them. The Hunters are going West tomorrow, and will not be able to help thee a second time."

"We'll manage." Thalia said the words like she was trying very hard to convince herself of them. Suddenly she frowned. "What do you mean, _if_ we leave? You just said you weren't staying."

"I did." Zoë watched the girl carefully, trying to decipher the look in those crackling blue eyes. "I would like very much if you were to come with us."

She'd expected shock or even apology; Thalia's slightly confused grin was a surprise. "Can't," she said. "You guys are going the wrong way. Uh, girls."

"We are only going the wrong way if you intend to reach Camp Half-Blood. There are other options, for a girl." Zoë inclined her head toward the firelight. "You have the makings of the finest Hunter in centuries; I can see that after only a handful of hours with thee. We would benefit greatly from thy company, and you would be considerably safer with us. There are few monsters the Hunt cannot easily handle; and those are still wary, for fear we will be luckier than they."

There was the shock. Thalia actually took half a step back.

"You...want me to be a Hunter?"

"I would like thee to consider it," Zoë replied. "I wish Lady Artemis were here tonight to accept an oath, but we could bring thee with us until she returns. The Hunters would suffer for thy loss."

Thalia hesitated. "What about Luke and Annabeth?"

Zoë considered the question. "Annabeth is...very young," she said. "Nine years old, I believe?" Thalia nodded sharply. "Then she is not _too_ young; Artemis' minimum has traditionally been eight years. We prefer our recruits to be slightly older, better able to fully understand the decision, but we have had many Hunters her age over the years. You met Ari—she joined us when she was ten years old. Alene had barely broken her eighth birthday. They were exceptional cases—but then, so is this. There would be a place with us for Annabeth, if she wanted it."

Thalia's eyes narrowed. "What about Luke?" she demanded.

"He is a boy," Zoë explained. "He cannot be a Hunter, but Chiron's camp will accept him."

"If he's not eaten first!"

"The deadliest prisoners of the Underworld have not been released to hound a son of Hermes," Zoë pointed out. "The monsters are tracking _thee_. I do not say this to place blame; you have done nothing wrong. But it is entirely possible the boy would be safer without thy company. The monsters will likely continue running thy scent, and they will track thee into our midst, and we can send them back to Tartarus where they belong."

"Likely," said Thalia. "You mean you don't know."

Zoë rested a hand on her shoulder. "I do not know for certain," she said. "But I know this; thy scent will only grow exponentially stronger the longer you continue to run, and the more you begin to consciously use thy powers. With the sheer number and strength of the monsters you are already attracting, I do not believe you will survive to see Camp Half-Blood."

It was cruel, perhaps, to say it so plainly. It was also the truth.

Thalia shoved the comforting hand away. "So help us!" she demanded. "What do you want me to do, grab Annabeth and run off? 'Gee, Luke, thanks for saving my life a freaking million times, I'm taking the kid, good luck not dying because of all the monsters that follow me everywhere'? He's my friend!"

Zoë was not unsympathetic to the young demigod. Thalia had experienced more than enough pain and betrayal already. "Would a friend not understand the decision? We can offer thee safety. Protection. And we can offer a family, as well. You would not have to be alone, Thalia. You would have sisters—the support of every Hunter, you would have Lady Artemis behind thee. You would be taught to fight—truly fight, not just desperately scramble to survive. You could _belong_ with us."

"And all I have to do is abandon my best friend in Middle Of Nowhere, Alabama with a horde of monsters on his heels!"

"We are in Mississipi, actually," Zoë pointed out.

"See? We're not even sure where we are! I can't leave him _here_. We promised each other we'd make sure all three of us got to this Camp or whatever. I _keep_ my promises!"

"And I do not fault thy loyalty!" Zoë was positive _she_ had never been this stubborn. "If you try to make Camp Half-Blood on foot, you will _die_. You are throwing away thy life and the lives of thy friends for pride, half-blood, and for the sake of a promise made to a boy who in all likelihood will never fully appreciate it!"

There was a brief pause, and then her ears popped as the air pressure in their small section of woods dropped dramatically. The air suddenly smelled like rain—like the stillness before a storm broke that sent small animals running for cover.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Thalia growled.

Zoë resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Thalia was tired and under an inhuman amount of stress, and the boy had been her sole source of support for far too long. Rude as he had been since the giant attack, Thalia considered him a friend. Zoë could be patient.

"Thy friend is a hero," she said, low and careful.

"Yeah," Thalia snapped. "He is."

Zoë shook her head impatiently. "No. I mean that he is a _hero_. A demigod, a male half-blood. And heroes share a fatal flaw in that they forget, very easily, the people who have helped them and the sacrifices those people have made."

Sparks danced over Thalia's eyes. "Luke's not going to forget me," she said, "because I'm not leaving him!"

"You know him better than I." Zoë very carefully did not voice the opinion that Thalia's dependence on the boy was blinding her to his less pleasant traits. "But he will not mean it as a betrayal. Male demigods...they incline by nature toward viewing themselves as the hero of their story. As the center of every possible event."

"Shut up!" Blue flashes of electricity were flickering around Thalia now—a Tesla coil humming with fury. "Luke's not like that! He didn't have to stay with me! He knew it would be dangerous and he didn't care!

Zoë plowed forward recklessly. "They believe the world revolves around their experiences, and it is much easier for them to believe that everything they have accomplished was done solely on their own merits. If, by some miracle, you make it to Camp Half-Blood alive—and you will _not_, not alone—thy friend will very soon forget that you accepted certain death rather than break a promise to him, even when you could have saved thyself. He will take it as a given that you would do such a thing, not respect it as the ultimate sacrifice."

"I said _shut up about Luke!"_

It took several seconds for Zoë to register exactly what had happened. She was flat on her back; her ears were ringing and there were hazy blue-red shapes swimming in front of her eyes—imprints of the trees silhouetted by a blinding light. There were raw, vivid scars along the surrounding trees where the bark had been stripped away in long chunks; broken pieces of branch littered the ground or hung precariously above them. The Hunters, eyes wild, were taking positions in a wide half-circle around her with arrows already drawn.

Also, she was fairly certain her shirt was on fire.

"Thalia!"

Luke and little Annabeth were quick to run to their friend's side; Zoë felt a pang as she saw the little girl bravely clutching a dagger, standing just behind Luke but looking determined.

The laws of hospitality, it would seem, had been abandoned.

"Zoë, are you all right?" Cynthia's voice was steady as always.

Zoë answered her with as dignified a groan as she was capable of, gesturing at the Hunters to stand down. Thalia was much less inclined to follow orders.

"You—you've got some nerve, you know that?" she said. "_You're_ calling _us_ self-centered!"

"I am not," Zoë said irritably, brushing ash off her sleeves. "I am stating a fact."

There was another, smaller explosion of lightning that merely knocked Zoë off her feet and sent a bolt of pain down her spine. This time when the arrows came up, a wave was not sufficient to call the Hunters off.

"Thalia," said Luke. "What's going on?"

"We're leaving," she snapped. "_Now_."

"You will not make it—"

"_FINE!_" Thalia shouted. "Then we'll die! But we'll do it together, the way we're meant to! I'm not betraying anyone to sign my whole life away to be some—some goddess' pet! The gods have ruined our lives enough, it's all they do!"

"Watch thy tongue, half-blood," Zoë warned her.

"_I__t's all they do_. Look at _you!_ Some—some glowing lady gives you table scraps and you spend thousands of years running around worshiping her, doing her dirty work while she's off drinking nectar on Olympus, following her rules, giving her sacrifices, fawning all over her like she's some kind of hero—I've met dogs that aren't that stupid! I'd _rather_ die alongside my friends than spend forever having to be all nice and gooey because some religious fanatic gave me a choice of joining her or being _abandoned in the woods to die_. If Artemis is anything like you—"

"I said _watch thy tongue, girl_—"

"Then she's a manipulative, delusional brat who blackmails people into being her servants and expects them to be _grateful_, and maybe Hera was right and everyone would be a lot better off if she'd never been born!"

No less than eight silver arrows leaped for her throat, but at the last possible second Thalia's thumb brushed one of the silver chains at her wrists and a shield flashed open over her head. The arrows scattered harmlessly into the trees and all of the Hunters except Kim (who had already fit another arrow to her string) hissed and turned aside as the aegis caught the moonlight. Even Zoë flinched.

"_Thalia_." Now Luke sounded urgent. "Let's go."

Thalia spared a moment to glower at Zoë, but the boy tugged at her elbow again and they turned and ran into the woods.

"Zoë." This was Diana. "Do we go after them?"

Very, very briefly, she almost said yes. Almost three thousand years of love and devotion were clawing at her chest, baying for the girl's blood—but she did have those thousands of years, and Thalia was a frightened child alone, lashing out like a wounded animal in a trap.

She gritted her teeth and turned away.

"No," she said shortly. "Let them run."

* * *

**September 8th, 1982; 250 Feet Off Southbound Interstate 29, North Dakota**

North Dakota _sucked_.

Ari had come to this conclusion about six hours ago, and nothing in those six hours had done anything but confirm it. This was the worst state _ever_. Everything was gray, flat, empty, and full of dust and depression. And she was cold. And her feet were wet. And it was _windy_.

At least they had a fire, sort of. It was sad and kept spitting sparks at random people because the wood was damp, but it was better than nothing. This was the part of being a Hunter they didn't put in the pamphlets; the days when they'd come off worse in a fight, Zoë wasn't back yet, and the best shelter they were able to find was a small cluster of trees in a field wrapped in Mist so the mortal who owned it wouldn't start wondering about the silver tents.

Even Artemis was affected by how miserable this place was, they could tell. It wasn't often that she decided to skip actually hunting anything for dinner and just waved up some basic food—usually after a really hard day when a lot of people were hurt or just too tired to do any hunting. Zoë always said she didn't want them getting dependent on that kinda thing. But even on _those_ days it was usually better than crackers, cheese and cold cuts.

When hunting goddesses were too stressed to concentrate on feeding themselves, it was a bad day.

She really wished Zoë would just come back.

Zoë'd been gone for two months now, and they hadn't heard from her in a week. Ari shivered as she poked a piece of baloney back between its crackers. She didn't think she'd ever forget the look on Zoë's face. They'd just been eating dinner, like always, when all of a sudden Zoë's eyes went all wide and she looked... Ari never wanted to see anyone look that scared again. She hadn't even gotten a chance to ask what was wrong before Zoë'd kicked her in the side hard enough to break one of her ribs and sent her flying off the stump she'd been sitting on.

It still hadn't been fast enough to stop that giant black arrow from slicing through her arm deep enough that she'd actually seen her own bone, but if Zoë hadn't kicked her if would've gone straight through her heart from behind.

Ari'd never actually been around to see the Hunters _lose_ people before. Sarah'd only been around for a few years and Ari didn't even know her very well. She was just some daughter of Athena they'd picked up. But she didn't deserve to die like that. And then...Orion, they said his name was Orion...he laughed. He would've laughed over killing her, too. She got why Zoë wanted to kill him. He _needed_ to die. She just didn't like to think about Zoë being out there alone with him.

Someone put their hand on her shoulder, and she jumped.

"She'll be all right, Ari," Cynthia said, rubbing her shoulder gently. "She's done this before."

Ari fidgeted. She didn't like people being able to tell what she was thinking so easy. "She ever get him?" she asked finally, under her breath.

Cynthia did that weird thing where she and Diana stared at each other for a few seconds before she answered. "Several times," she said, and squeezed Ari's shoulder. "Though never without Artemis' help."

Ari's head snapped up, scared. "What?"

Phoebe cleared her throat and looked at Cynthia like, _really? You couldn't word it any better than that?_ and leaned forward to say something, but she was interrupted by Artemis' quiet voice.

"The Hunter—Orion—is a giant," she said, a little too calmly. "He can only be defeated by a mortal and a god in cooperation."

Ari tried not to panic. "Then why—"

Artemis held up a hand. "Zoë knows what she is doing. We have...dealt with this problem before." For a second her eyes looked dark, but then it passed. "He knows that in a fair fight, against me, he would be destroyed. He also knows my weakness." Ari frowned, and the goddess smiled at her, but there was something sad about it. "You, little one. My Hunters. You are my greatest joy and my greatest vulnerability. There is a reason he strikes at you with such hatred. Every life lost among my Hunters is as good as an arrow in my heart. He knows this."

Phoebe picked up for her. "Zoë's the next best thing to Artemis, and everyone knows it. That's why she's been Iris-messaging us, kid. She's trying to track him down so Lady Artemis knows exactly where to go, and they can knock him back to Tartarus for a few hundred years. If they were both out there—"

"Or if they switched places," Cynthia pointed out quietly.

"Yeah, or that, if Orion gave them the slip we'd be dead meat. This way if Zoë loses the trail, she'll at least know he's not doubling back on _us_."

Ari wished her voice sounded less small. "But what about _her?_"

Artemis' eyes tightened, and Cynthia squeezed Ari's shoulder and did that held-gaze thing with Diana again. Ari promised herself that if _she_ lived for two thousand years, she wasn't gonna get that weird.

"My brave one," Artemis said, sounding like her heart was breaking. "We can only wait for word."

The mood around their pathetic little fire dropped even lower. Ari kicked a pebble.

A twig snapped nearby, and she was on her feet with the others aiming into the darkness before the sound had even really registered.

The darkness made a pained sound.

"You will not need to wait long," it said, sounding like it was speaking through clenched teeth, and Zoë limped out of the trees.

Most of the others cried out at seeing her again, and the miniature forest of silver bows disappeared. Ari, who'd recognized Zoë's voice the moment she heard her grunt, was halfway across the circle to hug her when she noticed the blood.

"_Sit_," Artemis was saying. Her voice snapped like thin ice in winter, and for a second Ari was almost scared of her. But Artemis looked scared, too—and worried. Sometimes Zoë sounded really angry like that, too, when she thought Ari was doing something dangerous. Ari figured that was kind of like loving someone. Zoë sat.

Now that she didn't look like she was about to fall over, Ari couldn't resist anymore. She jumped forward and latched onto Zoë's side, squeezing her tightly. Zoë hissed, but put an arm around Ari to stop her from pulling away.

"I will be fine, my friend," she said, smiling. She had a split lip, which was kind of ruining the effect.

Diana moved forward, already pulling a cloth and a vial of nectar out of her bag. "What hurts?" she asked, and cut Zoë's reply off with "And don't say _nothing_, or I'm drugging you."

Zoë turned to Artemis for support. The goddess lifted an eyebrow coolly and didn't say anything.

"...Three ribs," Zoë sighed. She pushed on Ari's shoulder until the younger Hunter stood up, but it was only to move her to her uninjured side. "The leg is the worst. The head wound is mending; the shoulder will heal."

"Hades, Zoë," said Phoebe. "What happened?"

Zoë glared at her. "Violence."

Artemis cleared her throat.

"What happened?" she asked, quietly.

Zoë flushed and looked away.

"I thought I had him outmaneuvered, my lady," she said to no one in particular. Her hand came up and fiddled with Ari's hair. "I thought I had him tricked—in the same way we did last time. You remember." Artemis nodded sharply, and Zoë continued. "He...will not fall for the same tricks twice. I thought I knew where he was, and I very nearly walked into an ambush."

"You didn't," Cynthia pointed out. Diana nodded in agreement, then frowned and snapped her fingers. Zoë shrieked—if she'd been less worried, Ari would have laughed at how undignified it was—as her ribs jumped back into place with a series of CRACKs.

Zoë groaned and hugged herself. "Was that entirely necessary?" she hissed.

"Yes," Diana answered bluntly. "Take your pants off." Artemis and Zoë choked at the same time, and the healer threw her hands in the air. "_You have a giant arrow wound in your thigh!_"

She took the white handkerchief she'd used to dab nectar on Zoë's lip, placed it over her hand, and pressed it against Zoë's dark jeans. It came away red, shot through with gold. Ari felt sick.

Cynthia stood up across what used to be a fire and had apparently given up. "We'll let you work, Di," she said with a smile, holding out a hand for Alene to follow her. "We might as well sleep early anyway. We're glad to see you back safe, Zoë."

Artemis nodded approval of the plan, and the others started moving toward their tents too. All of them echoed Cynthia's welcome as they filed out, but Ari stayed tucked against Zoë's good side. Artemis glanced at her and she expected to be told to go to bed, but the goddess just reached out and brushed a strand of hair behind her ear and didn't say anything.

Zoë eased her jeans off, wincing, and Ari buried her head in her lieutenant's shoulder when she saw the gash in her leg.

"I might have to wake Phoebe back up," Diana muttered to herself as she carefully pulled off the blood-soaked bandage Zoë had tied over the wound and replaced it quickly with a nectar sponge—a technique she'd invented, she claimed. Medicinal pressure pad. "You have to have gotten near your limit for nectar just to get back and she knows more modern first-aid than I do." She looked up. "Ari, can you feel her forehead? Let me know if it starts to get hot. You'll know, trust me."

While Ari wiggled into position, Artemis sat forward.

"I am sorry I was not there, dear one," she said softly.

Zoë shook her head. "I did not have a chance to call thee," she said. "By the time I realized I was being stalked, any pause would have given him the advantage. He is less deadly in close quarters, so long as you do not allow him to close. He has strength, but lacks maneuverability."

"Yes," said Artemis. She sounded sad. "I know."

Now she and Zoë were doing the staring-into-each-other's-eyes thing, too. It felt like interrupting, but Ari finally managed to ask, "Who...who is he?"

At first Ari thought maybe they hadn't heard her, because they didn't move. Finally, Artemis sighed and broke eye contact with Zoë to look at her.

"A good man," she said. "Once, long ago, he was a good man."

The look Diana shot at her made Ari think she probably didn't agree, but the Hunter didn't say anything. She just focused on using an eyedropper to drip nectar into Zoë's hurt leg.

"What happened?" Ari whispered.

Artemis stared at her hands. "Orion was... a favorite of mine. He was charming, respectful, eager to prove himself."

"Handsome," Diana supplied. "And aware of the fact."

"He has laser alien eyes," Ari said doubtfully, which made Zoë laugh. Even Artemis cracked a smile.

"Perhaps," she said. "But as I said, he was charming, and if he flirted it never went beyond the friendly. And if you will recall, Diana, he responded immediately when Cynthia told him to cease his attentions to her. You may feel free to lower your hackles any century now."

"Peacock," Diana muttered.

Artemis shook her head at her healer, looking sort of...wistful. "Perhaps that was the first sign. I assumed at first that when he stopped his teasing and grew more serious and carefully formal with me, he was simply maturing. Growing into his role with the Hunt."

"He was a _Hunter?_ A _man_ Hunter?"

"The first," Zoë said. "And the last."

"Yeah." Diana didn't look up from monitoring the healing on Zoë's leg. "We can't have people falling in love with Lady Artemis, right, Zoë?"

"_Diana_." Artemis' voice was doing that ice-snap thing again. She looked like she was about to say something else, but then Zoë shouted something in Ancient Greek that Ari was pretty sure she'd be grounded for a millennium if she ever repeated.

"I had to drop undiluted nectar directly on an exposed nerve," Diana said apologetically. "Sorry. It would have been a lot worse if you weren't distracted. The adrenaline didn't hurt, either."

Artemis still looked like she was about to smite her, but she finally nodded and relaxed.

"Orion," she said to Ari, "wanted more from me than I was able to give. Do not mistake me." She sighed. "I loved him. But I loved him no differently than I love all of my Hunters. No more or less than I love _you_, young one. I did not, and could not, reciprocate."

Ari poked at Zoë's forehead. It was still normal-feeling. "So he decided to kill everyone?" Grown-ups were weird.

Artemis smiled sadly again. "If only it were that simple, little one. No. Orion decided to...give himself space. To spend more time alone with his thoughts and come to terms with his feelings, so that when he returned he would be better able to view me as his goddess and his leader. He took full responsibility for himself, and I did not fault him." For a split second her eyes flicked to Zoë and back. "We are none of us able to choose who we love."

There was a long pause. Diana apparently finished with Zoë's leg, because she wrapped a clean bandage around it and moved to sit next to her to check the bump on her head.

"He died," Artemis said simply. Ari shivered and curled closer to Zoë, who hugged her. "He was alone, and Scorpius...should not have risen for another five hundred years. It was summoned—given strength from some greater power. He...what is left of him...credits Gaea. It is as likely an explanation as any other. Giants can never be truly killed, of course. Three hundred years later..."

"I had never met him before," Zoë said.

Artemis smiled again, and this one seemed a lot less sad. "You were so young then," she said.

"I am older than thee."

"As you delight in reminding me at every opportunity. Yes, you had not been a Hunter for more than...oh, a little over a century, I should think. Orion returned, but he was..."

Zoë's hand left Ari's shoulder to brush against her goddess' arm.

"Changed," she supplied.

Artemis nodded, just once. "How could he be otherwise? Three hundred years in Tartarus and I believe I would be far worse, when I returned."

"No," Zoë protested, but Artemis waved her silent.

"His memory was...not inaccurate, but it was colored strangely. He remembered events as they had transpired but with wildly different contexts, interpretations that made no sense. He seemed utterly determined to... rekindle a relationship that had simply never existed. Explanations that such a thing would never happen seemed not to reach his ears. In the end..."

Again, Zoë stepped in.

"Thy brother intervened," she said. Now Zoë's voice sounded cold too. Ari was starting to regret asking for this story. She liked the ones about defending Troy a lot better, even though they'd lost. Talking about Troy didn't make Zoë sound like this. "He meant well, my lady. Lord Apollo usually does."

"Quite." Artemis squeezed Ari's hand reassuringly. "_Lord Apollo _also has a charming tendency toward collateral damage. You don't need to hear most of this, little one. Suffice it to say that Orion died by my hand, and that as frustrated as I was by his condition I had never blamed him for it, and would never have chosen to end his life the way I did. Orion returned to Tartarus knowing only that he loved me, that I killed him, and that I did not tell him why."

Ari was starting to understand. "But giants can't die."

"No," Zoë said. "They cannot."

"He just keeps coming back worse, doesn't he?" she whispered. "Every time you kill him he comes back crazier."

Zoë reached out and held Artemis' elbow.

"Yes," the goddess said finally. "And we have no choice. His mind is gone and he slaughters innocents for the joy of causing me pain. We have no choice but to kill him."

Ari pressed into Zoë's side. "But you got him, right?"

Silence.

"Zoë?" That was Artemis.

Zoë swallowed. "Wounded, my lady. Not dead. Not even crippled. All I have done is force him back into the shadows. I had to look to my own life in the end."

"As you should," Artemis said immediately. "I would not lose you to Orion, Zoë. You did well, and he will not attack again while I am here. We can take preventative measures until he makes another mistake. Rest, my dear one. You have more than earned it." She put her hand on Ari's shoulder and guided her onto her feet. "You as well, Ari, if you are satisfied that Zoë is going to survive."

Ari scuffed the toe of her shoe in the dirt, feeling tongue-tied. She nodded.

Diana stood up with her. "That's all I'm comfortable doing for now," she said. "Let the nectar work overnight and I'll check the leg again in the morning."

"Thank you, Diana," Artemis said evenly. Zoë grimaced, but nodded to the healer. She looked a lot less tense with Artemis running her fingers through her hair. Diana nodded to them both, and ducked into her tent. Zoë caught Ari's eye and smiled a little before nodding toward her and Phoebe's tent. Reluctantly, Ari turned to go inside.

She didn't often bother trying to be tactful, but she decided not to mention that she'd seen the way Zoë curled into Artemis and clung to her as soon as she thought they were alone. It wasn't nice to tell someone you saw them cry.

* * *

**Three Days Following the Vernal Equinox, AD 992; Brittany**

"Is this entirely necessary, my lady?" Zoë sighed.

Artemis raised an eyebrow as she continued to work her lieutenant's hair free of its braid. "I'm surprised at you, Zoë," she said mildly. "I believe analyzing the movements of this hellhound pack to be essential."

She couldn't see Zoë's face, but she knew the girl was rolling her eyes.

"That is not what I meant," she muttered.

Artemis, having mostly undone Zoë's hair, hummed noncommittally and picked up a brush.

"The pack was moving north, you said."

Zoë sighed and moved the map so that her goddess could see it more easily. "Yes," she said. "But they are moving slowly. They appear to be primarily following the coast, not chasing any particular prey."

Artemis hummed thoughtfully. "If they turn up a scent more interesting than mortal beasts, we shall have a chase on our hands."

Zoë wrinkled her nose as she frowned at the map. "Indeed. It is a situation I would rather avoid, especially with the newer Hunters. I am not comfortable asking them to run that pace and be ready for a fight at the end of it."

Artemis nodded in agreement and began working the frizz and tangles out of Zoë's hair, moving carefully from the bottom up. "Ideally, we would work our way around from the east and cut them off."

Zoë hummed, but didn't seem convinced. "It would be better than attempting to take them from out current position," she agreed. "Spook the pack and they will scare up the coast and we will be worse off than we are now."

Artemis ran her fingers through her lieutenant's hair, satisfied that she had worked out the looser knots, and switched over to a comb. "Ah," she observed as Zoë prodded colored flags experimentally. "You fear a similar result should we attempt to meet the pack from the north?"

"Yes," Zoë said simply. "They might flee south again, which would not be as disastrous because we would be closer. But if they scattered inland..."

Artemis pinched a lock of hair near the root to avoid causing Zoë unnecessary pain as she worked at a particularly stubborn knot. "You don't believe we would be capable of keeping them pinned against the coast?" she asked sceptically. "Perhaps you give yourself and your sisters too little credit."

"If we meet them from too high, they will be able to retreat south and then southeast," Zoë insisted. "It would break up the pack, true, but—ow."

"My apologies, dear one." Artemis set the comb aside and went back to work with the soft brush. "I see what you mean. Better to take care of the pack as a whole than risk scattering them. They would be easier to deal with, but I can personally think of a great many ways I would rather spend the winter than chasing down...how many were there?"

"Forty-three, my lady."

"Forty-three separate hellhounds," Artemis continued. "It sounds a thankless task to me."

"Quite," Zoë agreed.

Artemis considered it while her hands worked. "So," she said quietly. "We need to avoid engaging the pack from a position too far north. That was well-spotted," she added, running her thumb over Zoë's neck. "It might be worth the effort to make a much wider circle, then."

Zoë moved the black 'hellhound' markers back to their original positions, and traced a half-oval experimentally over the map with her finger. Artemis shook her head and leaned over beside her, motioning a slightly wider and less symmetrical approach. The nymph's eyes widened in understanding.

"A bold move," she murmured. Artemis' route swung wider to the east at first, then cut almost in a straight line to intersect the hellhound pack at the place they had estimated the monsters would be in three weeks' time. A mistake would be disastrous and might lose them the pack entirely, but if they could pull it off they would have the hellhounds pinned against the coast and with no easy route north or south.

"But, perhaps, worth the risk?" Artemis sat back and let Zoë examine the markers at her leisure while she worked her hair back into a tighter, cleaner braid. After several long minutes in which Zoë considered the map, her lieutenant sat up straighter and tried to look over her shoulder without jostling the goddess.

"I think that we may as well make an effort at the best plan," she said neutrally. "If it fails, we will deal with the consequences, but I believe we have a strong chance at success."

Artemis' lips twitched. Zoë had always been cautious with every life but her own. "A ringing endorsement from you, my wary darling. Very well, then. We will move in the morning and make the wide swing." She bound the bottom of her fresh braid tightly and kissed her lieutenant's temple as Zoë began gathering up notes and markers. "Clear these away, and I'll arrange something for us to eat."

* * *

**Late Spring, 831 BC; Thrace**

She wasn't going to make it.

Some part of her—some foolish, naïve part—had held out hope that when she got to Greece, when she entered the realm of the gods, her father's creatures might fall back. It was all that had kept her going; the thought that, maybe, she might be able to find somewhere safe.

Zoë tripped as a loose stone rolled under her foot, unable to keep from crying out as she twisted her ankle and sheared a layer of skin from her knee at the same time. But there was a shriek from behind her—the dracaenae were closing in. And stubbornly, without knowing why she bothered, she forced herself back onto bare, bleeding feet and kept running.

At first she had been followed by a single group of monsters—bounty hunters, probably, set on their course by her father or sisters to bring back her head. At first all it had meant was that she didn't dare stay in one place for long—then for more than a day, then for more than a night's sleep.

Word had spread among the monsters. The Titan's daughter has been cast out, and he wants her blood. Atlas had given them permission to feast on a delicacy they had never tasted before.

Even if she had somewhere to go, there was no possible way she would survive long enough to get there. She wasn't going to make it until morning.

In a desperate attempt to buy herself a few more seconds, Zoë veered sharply to the side and slid down a steep, rocky cliff until she slammed into a tree that broke her fall, and also possibly her skull. She was in too much pain already to tell the difference. Her feet were half shredded, she was bleeding from where she'd skinned her knees repeatedly, sharp pebbles from the fall had cut her skin, and her chest burned as she fought desperately to breathe. What was some slight disorientation from cracking her head against a tree trunk, when she was dead already?

She tried to force herself to keep running. She really, truly did. But her newly-mortal body had nothing more to give her. She stumbled a few feet, left bloody footprints in the grass; and then her head swam and her vision flashed red as she was forced to drop to her knees in order to stay conscious. She gasped and tried desperately to suck air into her burning lungs, to no avail.

There was a louder shriek, from closer than ever. Zoë barely noticed through the pounding in her head. She'd fallen just a few feet from a stream, and that seemed so much more important when she hadn't had a chance to drink all day, and she'd been running so hard for so long...

She found she didn't have the strength to do more than hold herself on her hands and knees out of sheer determination. A shadow fell across her field of vision, and her arms shook with the effort of supporting her own weight, and she waited for the end.

"Be at peace, brave one." The voice, sad and gentle, was not remotely the monster's rasp she had been expecting. "You will not be harmed tonight."

Zoë had been surviving on pure adrenaline for as long as her body was willing to endure. She collapsed, and was just barely caught by small, strong hands before she hit her head on another tree.

"Steady," the voice murmured. "My Hunters will be with us shortly, and Diana will be a greater help than I; my brother was always more of the healer. Focus on breathing for now, brave girl. Your heart is beating like a rabbit's."

Head still swimming, Zoë sat back carefully on her heels and tried to fill her lungs again. Her throat constricted and she retched, but there was nothing in her stomach to bring up, so she just felt miserable.

A hand on her shoulder, and her savior pressed a horn filled with water to her lips. Zoë ended up choking and turning aside—she couldn't breathe and drink at the same time—but even having cool water splash her was heaven. If only they weren't both about to die.

"Do you have a name, brave one?"

"Zoë," she rasped. She could feel her heartrate settling back into normal range, and while her lungs were still burning she was at least able to breathe again. "Daughter—" Only she wasn't.

There was a sigh. "Yes. I know your father, brave one. So the rumors are true, then. Atlas _did_ want you dead."

Zoë shook. "Yes."

Another sigh, and the refilled horn was pressed into her trembling hands. "Drink," the voice said, although now that her vision was clearing Zoë could see that it did, actually, belong to a person. A young woman, it seemed, with auburn hair cropped close like a man's and eyes that glimmered like liquid gold through moonstone. "I am sorry for your ordeal. Rest easy for now; your father's minions will not trouble you again."

Zoë lowered the horn of water reluctantly, frowning. "What do you...?"

The girl raised an eyebrow. "News to you? That surprises me. They did not die quietly."

Zoë remembered the shrieks that she had assumed were cries of rage.

"...I see," she said. "Then I am in thy debt. Lady Artemis."

A slow smile spread across the goddess' face, and her serious eyes lit up with a spark of amusement. "I wondered if you would know me."

Zoë bowed slightly. "Even in the garden of my sisters, the Twelve are known. Though I did not think to meet thee."

And there was the sadness again. "Nor I, especially under these circumstances. You have my condolences, Zoë. You are not the first, nor shall you be the last, to be treated in such a way. I am only glad we reached you in time. Can you stand?"

Zoë accepted the hand she was offered; the goddess paid no attention to the fact that she was covered in sweat, blood, and dust, helping her carefully onto her feet and brushing sweat-soaked hair out of her face with a care that bordered on tenderness. Without fear thundering through her veins, standing on her sliced and bleeding feet was almost unbearable, and she stumbled.

Artemis caught her again, and winced when she saw the state of the girl's feet. She helped her limp to the stream, where she could sit down.

"Rest," the goddess said sternly. "You may go where you wish in the morning. While the moon is high, you will rest and heal in my care." She turned her head slightly as if someone had called her name, and smiled. "My Hunters have finished off the last of your pursuers. They will join us in a moment."

Zoë, biting her lip to keep from cringing as she tried to clean the cuts on her feet and knees, still smiled at that.

"I am grateful for the chance to thank them," she said quietly. "I owe them my life."

Artemis looked at her with immense interest. "I think they would very much like to meet you as well," she said. "Especially Callisto. I imagine she will like you very much; that you were able to survive long enough for us to reach you shows unspeakable courage and strength." Suddenly she smiled, and a bit of that mischievous spark returned to her eyes. "But as for owing them anything, I wouldn't worry about it overmuch. There was a dragon trailing you. Diana will be _delighted_."

Zoë opened her mouth to ask what that meant, but Artemis winked and nodded to the horn she was still holding. Zoë drank obediently.

The moon glittered off the mountain stream as her pulse and breathing finally started to settle. Somewhere an owl announced its presence, and somewhere slightly further away the Hunters were running to their goddess in triumph, but for the moment it was still, and safe, and quiet.

Zoë closed her eyes as distant footsteps grew closer, and came home.

* * *

**Candlemas, 1968; Ouachita National Forest, Arkansas**

Zoë spared her goddess an exasperated look, but set aside her knife and leaned into her.

Artemis nuzzled her temple gently.

"You," she repeated quietly, "work too hard."

Zoë rolled her eyes and bumped her head lightly against her goddess'. "She asked," she said softly. "It is no burden to help her feel more competent. She needs it."

Artemis hummed. Zoë could feel her fondness for Ari ringing through their empathy link, and she relaxed into her arms. Artemis' approval spiked.

"Will you walk with me, dear one?" she murmured. "Mornings as lovely as this are rare. Come look out over the forest with me. The Hunters will survive." She traced slow, feather-light circles just above Zoë's hip, and the nymph's eyes drifted closed. For several long minutes she let herself bask in the sensation of late-winter sun and Artemis' touch drawing the sensation of the wild into sharper focus. The air was cleaner, the cold simultaneously crisper and less unpleasant. The scent of pine became almost heady. She could taste snow and holly and hard sap on her tongue.

She turned and kissed Artemis' cheek.

"Another time," she whispered, and sat forward to stop Ari from misaligning her feathers. There was only so long a young girl could be expected to fumble through trial and error without losing heart.

Ari needed her. Zoë knew exactly where she belonged.


End file.
